Tag: Caitlin Gerard

Insidious here, get your insidious here! Can’t get enough of those James Wan other worldly horror films? Then we got a new one here!

At this point it is the fourth Insidious film, but we are delving straight into the side story parts now. We don’t get a number, we get Insidious: The Last Key. It took Paranormal Activity to get to film 5 before it abandoned their numbers for a side story instead.

Just because there is a last in the title, don’t assume it is the last Insidious film. That is a lie in every horror franchise, no matter what they say.

Instead, at this point, go in expecting some more details and unfortunately a lot more questions.

It is important to have your security look nice before they fuck up a spirit.

Our favorite psychic, Elise Rainier (Lin Shaye), didn’t have a fun time growing up. This takes place after Chapter 3, and before the first film still, where she is rocking out with her two sidekicks, Tucker (Angus Sampson) and Specs (Leigh Whannell). Except she gets a call from a dude (Kirk Acevedo), who lives in Five Keys, New Mexico. Specifically, he lives in the home she grew up in. And again, this was not fun.

You see, Elise basically always had this ability. The skills to see dead spirits, talk to them, and really feel their pain. While it is cool for old Elise to do that, young girl Elise doing it made it really creepy. Her dad (Josh Stewart), worked at the next door prison (which had a high execution rate I guess), and he didn’t like her saying she saw things. He did the only logical thing in his mind, in the 1960’s, and he had to beat it out of her every time she decided to lie about ghosts.

Hooray child abuse! Oh yes, we get a lot of pained girl screams and pleads for those who need to feel sad inside.

Anyways, also as a kid, Elise was visited by demons, helped free a powerful thing, and inadvertently killed her mom? Jeez. Either way, now, a billion years later, Elise has to return to the home that has too many memories, to hopefully put a stop to what started her a long time before.

Also starring in the past and the present ish, Caitlin Gerard, Spencer Locke, Aleque Reid, Ava Kolker, Pierce Pope, Bruce Davison, and Tessa Ferrer.

Breasts and horror go together sure, but sometimes even fully clothed it can feel excessive.

The beginning of the film is probably the best part of it, so after the long introduction of 10+ minutes (it feels like), just go ahead and leave. We start in the 60’s, it is creepy, we get the child abuse, the arguments, the scares, the creepy key stuff, and the deaths. Once we get back to modernish times, the film quickly just falls apart.

Sure, the sidekicks have some good jokes. And they tried to make some sort of coherent plot, that had its moments. The suitcase scare later on is bound to be a highlight.

But every damn time they go into The Further it just feels so goddamn stupid. And a significant portion takes place there, along with multiple entities and places. It just feels like they are just making up that place as they go, and whatever happens there is what a writer feels like doing, with no limits or cares in the world! It especially featured the worst acting of the film and the effects were, well, ghastly.

Don’t worry, we have tons of bad acting throughout the film as well. We get someone who is in his 70’s playing the dad to two daughters who are clearly supposed to be early 20’s and not apparently be awkward at all. An easy fix of saying “Granddaughters” instead would have made it less weird. Speaking of weird, the daughters have a lot more plot than one would expect. One of them is featured above and it is honestly the worst time I have seen a horror film try to also make a scary scene sexy. Imagine her having a panic attack on the ground, breathing up and down very hard. It isn’t sexy, no matter how much the boobs move, it is just uncomfortable and takings you out of the film.

The acting is bad in the flashbacks, and generally just bad when really any character interacts with any other character. It certainly doesn’t feel like the end of a series, but really, the beginning. But again, the beginning was neat, and some jokes made me laugh.

To start things off, I am not sure what this movie is actually called. I am decently sure at the time of this review being written, it was called The Assignment. Which yes, sounds like a sexy college film.

But before it was called Re-Assigment. And it might be changing to Tomboy, it is really hard to tell.

All of the titles make sense once you find out just what this movie is about though, and all of them seem to be various levels of offensive.

The beard is a lie.

Meet Frank Kitchen (Michelle Rodriguez). A famed mercenary killer. Deadly, accurate, sly, and he has a manly beard. He is so manly, we get to see him have sex with a woman Johnnie (Caitlin Gerard)! And she gives him her number for future sexy time, because he is a great lover. Oh we also get to see his penis after he showers. He is not a grower, he is all there always ready. What a dick!

Apparently Frank has made the wrong enemy though. While doing a job for Honest John (Anthony LaPaglia), a gangster, the tables are turn, Frank is captured. And when Frank wakes up, his beard is gone. And his dick. Oh hey, he has breasts and a vagina!

What in darnation!

Turns out Frank killed a guy, and his sister, Dr. Rachel Kay (Sigourney Weaver), a pissed off plastic surgeon, is…well, pissed off. And she does a gender reassignment surgery when Frank gets knocked out. A really great one, can’t see any scars, just perfect female body. And she provides hormones and everything, considering it an experiment.

Well, Frank wants revenge. He just has to deal with his hooters and presumably a now ticking biological clock. Or something. Also featuring Tony Shalhoub, as a psychiatrist, evaluating Kay after the fact.

Frank has to tape those bad boys down, how else could he function?

Wow. Where to begin. Um.

Well, there is a lot of nudity in his film. I cackled early on because of an unnecessary shower scene, generally reserved for females in a movie, but at this point, Rodriguez is a dude. And to flash us his chest and penis, just to show how much of a man he was. After the transition, we had Rodriguez nude a lot, of course in the early confusion, but in several scenes taping her body down to help prepare for a kill. And no, it isn’t even her naked, but a body double for those scenes.

Genitalia aside, the film is told from two narrators. Are doctor, in a straight jacket, talking to a psychiatrist about the events, and a video diary from Kitchen as a woman. So we know immediately that Kitchen will be successful. This is where the how is supposed to be a mystery, but it isn’t. It isn’t like a giant magic trick. It is just someone going and killing a ton of people, no surprises there. Although, she does use her sexuality in ONE scene, to distract a guard. That definitely happened.

Acting is bad, plot is bad, action is bad.

Now, is this movie offensive? Fuck if I know. I am not qualified to answer that question really. On the surface, it definitely sounds offensive. But at he same time, it does show a male-to-female character kicking ass and being consistently the coolest person in the room. And on the other hand, it was a magical forced transition that makes everything seem like a fairy tale.

Yeah, it is probably offensive. But really, I am just offended by how bad it was.

Watching random horror films is almost my go to now. Since I am so far behind, I look for one with a shitty or silly cover, and just go for it.

Smiley? That shit creeped me out. Dude has some sort of skin face, with eyes and a smile face stitched in, no real other features.

What is more surprising, regardless, is that the director of this film is Michael J. Gallagher, who you haven’t heard of. Why? Because as of Sept 1, 2013, he is only 24 years old, directing Smiley when he was 22/23. He has been directing shorts and other things since 2005, when he was 16, so the dude knows what he wants. It is just strange to see a movie at all directed by someone younger than 40, more or less. Kevin Smith directed Clerks when he was only 24, and look what happened to him. Can this guy be the next K. Smith?

That smile is like, mocking me. Go away creeper.

Trololololololol.

This movie takes place in a super modern world, where teenagers and college kids actually know about the internet. They have 4chan, Reddit, Anonymous hacker group and all of that shit. They also have a strange version of Chat Roulette. Okay, it is identical yo Chat Roulette minus the name. However, there is an urban legend going around that there is a dark entity that can kill people over video chat if you summon him.

“HOW DO YOU SUMMON HIM?” you ask, quite loudly. Well, you just have to type in the magic phrase three times.

“WHAT IS THE MAGIC PHRASE?” stop yelling.

I did it for the lulz.
I did it for the lulz.
I did it for the lulz.

Yeah. I am serious, this is true for the movie. You also have to want the person to die, it won’t work if you don’t believe. But when some college kids start testing its limits, they begin to freak out when they realize that Smiley knows what they look like, as he can see them through the other webcam. What if, after he kills for you, he eventually comes for you?

Starring Caitlin Gerard as our heroine, Melanie Papalia, Shane Dawson, and Andrew James Allen as other college kids, Keith David and Toby Turner as cops, and Roger Bart as an ethics professor.

Wait. Roger Bart? That dude. He was the singing voice of Young Hercules in Hercules. Weird as fuck.

I did your mom for the lulz.

Smiley is beyond ridiculous. You can tell from my description I hope. A young director does mean we get to see a movie about things that teens and college people know about today, so that was interesting.

The ending featured a twist I can say I didn’t see coming, but I loved, even if it didn’t really make sense. What they were trying to get at was pretty cool, and the implications of it in the real world can be felt. Sorry, trying to not give away the twist, but I am just sounding like a Vague Valerie.

Shit, just watch it maybe. Or let me spoil it for you. Or look it up. Either way, kind of a shitty movie, but it was a bit entertaining.